Dear Educational
Administration/Supervision graduate student:
Your professional
experiences have
taught you that public schools are part of a bureaucratic hierarchy,
and your
graduate studies teach you to administer within that structure. As you compare your work in schools with
the
ideas you study, though, you experience internal conflict.
It appears
that I was neither clever enough nor sufficiently self-analytic
to resolve the tensions between the
submerged and
unvoiced notion that teacher colleagues were very influential on my
teaching
practice and the claims made by supervision experts who were engaging
me with
models of supervision developed in colleges and universities across the
nation.
(Pp. 162-163)
As you experience similar tensions between practice and theory, you may conclude that your graduate classes are irrelevant. For students of educational administration, internal conflict and perceptions of irrelevance are common. These experiences have been extensively discussed in the field. Many professors believe the conflict and tension would be reduced if educational administration programs were more relevant to the work of school administrators.
But the source of tension and
internal conflict is not being foolish or studying
irrelevancies.
One purpose of this letter is to help you realize that these
feelings have different causes. A second
purpose is to
describe how educational administration programs are both relevant and
irrelevant, and a third purpose is to suggest how you can get the most
out of
your studies.
The Causes
One reason you experience conflict and tension is that you accept the assumptions underlying bureaucratic hierarchy: (1) superiors’ organizational purposes are more important than subordinates’, and (2) subordinates cannot be trusted to do what is best for the organization. The mistrusting, oppressive nature of bureaucratic hierarchy conflicts with your reasons for wanting to become an administrator.
I say you “accept” these assumptions because, during my years of interviewing candidates for educational administration programs, I have learned that aspiring principals want to become administrators for two main reasons: (1) to have greater influence on school programs and (2) to make a difference for students by working with teachers. On the surface these reasons are admirable and noble. On closer examination, however, they correspond perfectly with bureaucratic hierarchy’s assumptions. Having a greater impact on programming aligns with the first assumption -- superiors’ organizational purposes are more important than subordinates’. And making a difference by working with teachers aligns with the second assumption -- subordinates cannot be trusted to do what is best for the organization.
Almost all your school
experiences
have been bureaucratic. As a
consequence, you believe that, in the interests of control, efficiency,
and
effectiveness, teachers and administrators need to supervise
subordinates. Once you accept this “need,”
you are
accepting those two assumptions lying hidden, beneath bureaucratic
hierarchy. The first assumption
manifests itself in oppression, and the second in mistrust. You might claim not to share theses
assumptions because your reasons for wanting to become a school
administrator
are to assist others, not to oppress and mistrust them.
Within bureaucratic hierarchy, however,
oppression and mistrust are simply the basis for the
superior-subordinate
relationship. In order to address this
internal conflict, you need to realize that its cause is simply that
the assumptions underlying
administrative role requirements conflict with your altruistic,
admirable
motivations for wanting to become a school administrator.
The second cause of internal conflict arises from the fact that you are aspiring to change your superior-subordinate relationships. Presently you are a teacher who is required to oppress and mistrust students. As an aspiring administrator, however, you are moving into a situation in which you will be required to oppress and mistrust teachers. It is one thing to oppress students and assume they do not want what is best for the classroom. It is quite another to oppress professional educators and assume they do not want what is best for the school. How will you justify oppressing and mistrusting teachers, who, like you, are dedicated to doing what is best for students and the school? How will you not, in the eyes of teachers, become “one of them?” Realizing that this antagonism lies beneath teacher-administrator relationships, while clinging to the hope that you can avoid triggering it, causes this internal conflict.
The third cause of your conflict arises from the principal effectiveness and school effectiveness literature. These have taught you the following about the principalship:
“The buck stops with the principal.”
“Principal leadership is the key to school effectiveness.”
“The principal must have a vision.”
“The principal sets the climate and shapes the culture.”
“Principals need to be good managers and inspiring leaders.”
These exhortations inspire you, but they insult other school professionals while they preserve bureaucratic hierarchy. Being inspired by words that insult others is the third cause of your internal conflict. But don’t be hard on yourself. Many thoughtful, well-read people in the field believe these things about the principalship, which has blinded them to the realization that, if the word “teacher” replaced “principal,” the statements would be even more true, not less true.
To test this premise,
ask yourself,
“Would I prefer to send my children to a school with an effective
principal and
a weak faculty, or to one with an ineffective principal and a strong
faculty?” If you are like me, you would prefer the
second because your experiences have taught you
that the quality of the faculty is more important than the quality of
the person in the principal's office. Those experiences, however,
conflict with the litererature on effective principals and schools.
What does this say about the findings of these two bodies of research? It simply means that researchers found what they set out to find. Is it not common sense that schools with effective principals are likely to be better than schools with ineffective principals? Unfortunately, educators interpreted this to mean that principals are the key to school effectiveness, which has resulted in twenty years of exhorting principals to be instructional leaders. Because this misunderstanding of social science research findings has steered us away from faculty-oriented approaches to school leadership, you are about to embark on this ill-fated journey into the role of principal as instructional leader. If you administer in a middle or high school, your internal conflict is now a seed that is likely to grow.
The fourth cause of
internal
conflict arises from your graduate studies. At times your
principal preparation program challenges the assumptions of
bureaucratic hierarchy, even though you accept them.
Your professors and the texts and journals
you read ignore your school experiences.
They implore you to become leaders who develop trust, take
risks, shape
a culture of continuous improvement, and share a vision.
Your internal conflict is the same as that felt
by students in law school, medical school, and graduate programs in
public
administration, nursing, and business.
Professors ask you to envision a better world because you are
the next
generation of leaders. Your internal
conflict emerges from being asked to envision a system that is the
opposite of the one you experience. Which system is right?
Is another system possible? YOu sense that the one that is right
may not be the one that is possible -- hence, your conflict.
The fifth and final cause of internal conflict is that, even though
educational
administration graduate programs sometimes challenge the assumptions of
bureaucratic hierarchy, their purpose is to help you operate within it,
not to change it. Even if you understand that bureaucratic
hierarchy is based on mistrust , you are blinded to the significance of
this by your desire to become an effective administrator within the
system. So this conflict arises as you ask yourself two
questions: (1) Can I
operate within a bureaucratic, oppressive system? (2) Will I be able to
change it? Only you can answer the first question. The
answer to the
second question is, "No." You persist to believe you can change
it,
though, because you believe in yourself and the nobility of your
motivations for becoming a school administrator. You experience
internal conflict as your beliefs conflict with the reality you
are about to face.
Finally, you struggle with internal conflict as you pursue an administrative career because you know educators are well-intentioned, generous, caring people. You do not think of your superiors or colleagues as "mistrusters" or oppressors; and, if you recognize occasional mistrust and oppression, you see it as necessary to achieve a greater good. In other words, educators’ good intentions mask the fact that bureaucreatic hierarchy is based on the assumption that subordinates should not be trusted. Furthermore, good intentions make mistrust and oppression an acceptable means to an end. Educators’ good intentions deserve a closer look because you share them and they are genuine.
Good Intentions
Cause Conflict,
Too
Educators are devoted to helping others improve their lives, so good intentions motivate their behavior, policies, and decisions. Any accusation that they are mistrusting, deceitful, manipulative, or oppressive, is met with exasperation and defensiveness.
For example, North
Carolina
Superintendent of Public Instruction, Mike Ward, was incensed when the
Education Trust reported that
State Superintendent Mike Ward bristled
at the
notion that
"For the Education Trust to come along and suggest we're somehow deceitful, it is absolute nonsense," Ward said . . .
Ward acknowledged the figure doesn't
represent the
actual graduation rate. He said the Education Department agreed that
"There is nothing disingenuous," he said. "It's just what we had available until we can calculate the real graduation rate."
Although the state reported a 92 percent rate, “the Education Trust concluded the figure was closer to 63 percent” (Morrison, 2003, C1). Still, the state superintendent (who I know personally to be a dedicated, generous educator) was more concerned that somebody would accuse his agency of bad intentions, than he was about the data. As a North Carolinian, I was more concerned about the fact that the real graduation rate is closer to 63%, than whether or not the state had a good reason to report the data they did. Apparently, even in high stakes situations, educators focus more on their intentions than on the data themselves.
Good intentions are the
stock and
trade of educators. Many are fond of
saying their decisions are based on what is good for students. This sounds good because it reflects good
intentions. Educational
decision-making, however, rarely concerns a choice between what is good
for
students and what is not good for students.
In fact, “what is good for students” is often the cover reason
for
decisions that do little more than preserve the hierarchy.
The
According to Morrison (2003),
“Ward said the situation demonstrates flaws in the No Child Left
Behind legislation.
Instead of giving states a timetable to develop accurate reporting
systems, it
demanded that figures be submitted even if they aren't accurate.” Apparently,
Recently I asked a
North Carolina
Department of Public Instruction official why our state was undoing
education
policies that had been effective in raising student achievement in
order to
accommodate NCLB. He
answered that
Was this decision “best
for
students?” In a sense, it was. Federal funds going to the state (Title 1)
are for the lowest achieving students.
Helping them with federal money enables the state to provide
more
resources for all students. But
acquiring these resources justified the adoption of policies that did
not
benefit other
Although it would take
an extensive
cost-benefit analysis to answer that question, it requires no such
study to
recognize that the actions of
Since the publication of A Nation at Risk, in 1983, state bureaucracies have increasingly interfered with local education policy making. Now the federal government is interfering with state policy. The hierarchy has been both preserved and extended. In one of the great ironies of Republican politics, every state decision to accommodate NCLB extends the education bureaucracy to the federal level.
The point is that educational administrators, bureaucrats, and state legislators have good intentions. But they are required to oppress subordinates (teachers and students) because that is the nature of bureaucratic hierarchy. Actions that preserve hierarchy always take precedence over those that threaten hierarchy, even if they benefit students and teachers.
For example, without
the courage to stand
against this federal intrusion, state officials are left to express
their
frustration. According to Morrison
(2003), “Ward said
Even though you do not use this language, you recognize the “oppressive,” “mistrusting” nature of the public school bureaucracy. For example, you recognize that teachers are rarely dismissed because their classroom is too oppressive; but they are often dismissed if their classroom is not oppressive enough. Similarly, you know that principals are rarely dismissed because their school is too oppressive; but they are often dismissed if their school is not oppressive enough.
Bureaucratic hierarchy is based on the need to oppress and mistrust, and some of your professors ask you to recognize the power of these fundamental requirements. Your graduate program challenges you to understand that we have chosen this structure and we experience conflict as we mask its effects with good intentions. In other words, we sometimes ignore the effects of bureaucratic hierarchy and we teach that you should take risks, think critically, solve problems creatively, and build learning communities.
Your conflict results from knowing this is not what administrators do. Actual practice is either unrelated to these teachings or contradictory to them. To reduce the internal conflicts you experience as a student of educational administration, you must first understand they are caused by the contradictions between the nature of bureaucratic hierarchy and the program goals we profess.
Irrelevant Studies
What about relevance? Many before you have concluded that educational administration programs are irrelevant. Educational administrators consistently report that they learn school administration on the job, not in their graduate programs.
In response to this conclusion, educational administration organizations have convened multiple groups of professors and principals to align programs of study with the experiences of practitioners. Scholars have created lists of the knowledge, skills, and dispositions needed to become effective school administrators. Producing these lists has become a cottage industry in our field. And certain of these lists claim to set the standards that give legitimacy to our field (Murphy and Hawley, 2003).
But some professors see a problem with the belief that these lists and standards provide a useful, relevant curriculum. If our purposes are to teach the concepts, skills, and dispositions on these lists, we would be teaching future administrators to oppress and mistrust with efficiency, skill, and a smile. Some of us reject this purpose, even though this is what policymakers and students want.
I say students “want” this because our graduates consistently report that they want their studies to be relevant to the work they will do as school administrators. When asked to evaluate our program, one of our recent graduates expressed it this way:
Do more on data analysis; the more practical the better. Seventy-five percent of the classes include practical experience, but others are impractical, with too much busy work. Theory needs to be tied to the practical. The following are the holes in the program: day-to-day stuff, students, buildings, bus routes, lunchrooms and health inspections. Practical classes helped me get a good score on the leadership exam.
Another said,
There should be more
blending of
theory into real live applications. A
course for technology is needed. This
would prepare us, like doing the sample district budget.
More focus should be on middle and high
school scheduling.
According to these students, it is simple. Schools are bureaucratic hierarchies, and professors ought to teach aspiring principals to become effective bureaucratic functionaries.
But here is the problem with that approach -- each public school requires different knowledge, skills and dispositions to build master schedules, prepare budgets, design bus routes, discipline students, form good public relations, shape school culture, work with teachers to improve the school, etc. Clearly, the best place to learn these functions is within the context of the school. The worst place to try to learn them is in a graduate classroom.
Therefore, some educational administration reformers have developed intern-based programs in educational administration. But these programs, even more than classroom ones, promote the training of efficient, skillful, smiling "mistrusters." And they still have problems with relevance.
Interns carry out their
duties
removed from the essence of administration, which the Association of
Washington
Principals explains this way: “to build a structure of relationships in
the
school so that children have the opportunities to learn.” (Association
of
I know this from experience. I had two full-time, year-long, assistant principal internships -- one in 1978-79, and one in 1982-83. My experience in the first school led me to accept the second internship on the condition that I would never be considered an "intern.” The result was that my 1982-83 internship was much more productive for both the school and me.
So, while intern-based programs, and those that emphasize the practical aspects of the principalship, are becoming more popular and have the endorsement of many state legislatures, they are designed to prepare principals for the periphery work of the principalship, not the essence of principals’ work – “to build a structure of relationships in the school so that children have the opportunities to learn” (Association of Washington Principals, 2003). Veteran principals rightly point out that they learn this on the job. Instead of being a criticism, however, this observation ought to be considered a matter of course. Learning to administer a school, like learning to swim, requires that you “get in the water.”
Many professors recognize that learning to administer a school requires that you learn on-the-job, but they still resist turning the preparation of principals over to practitioners and school-based programs. They believe school administration students need to develop a theoretical foundation before they venture “into the water.” Similar to MBA programs -- professors expect students to apply organizational and social science theories to the practice of school administration.
Other professors, myself included, do not want educational administration programs to be like MBA programs. We regard all three approaches -- the knowledge, skills and dispositions approach; the pragmatic, intern-based approach; and the application of social science theory approach -- as irrelevant.
We believe the practice of educational administration is a uniquely moral and political responsibility, which involves leadership, relationships, vision, trust, and respect as the ingredients needed to build school communities. Furthermore, we know that, as soon as you become principals, you will be organizationally socialized to behave as bureaucratic functionaries. So, the graduate classroom is the only place to ask you to consider the moral responsibilities and the leadership possibilities of the principalship. Unless it is done then, it will never happen. Principals are so saturated with professional responsibilities and the expectations of others (Hurley, 2001) that they have no time to think about how to build community. For us, relevance comes from asking students to recognize that school administration is fundamentally moral and political.
Sergiovanni (1996) and Hodgkinson (1991) have described the moral aspects of school leadership. And from the beginning of your career as a public school teacher, you have accepted the moral responsibility of trying to provide equal educational opportunities for all students. Now you aspire to the principalship and superintendency to help others reach that ideal. The moral dimensions of school administration are obvious and they attract you to the profession.
On the other hand, the political nature of public school teaching and administering is not obvious and it has little appeal. Some of you wish politics could be kept out of education. One of our recent graduates captured both this attitude and the fundamental significance of educational politics in her portfolio:
As much as
educators hate to admit it, schools are political places
that function within the political arena.
Schools operate under the good will of the state and must rely
on
political leaders for funds to operate.
Legislators also dictate educational programs, such as the
federal
program, No Child Left Behind, or
It is easy to sit back and complain about education policy, particularly those with which we disagree. What should be our focus, however, is working to become part of the political process so that we can help effect change that is educationally sound for students.
Later, she mentioned the
ethical and moral aspects of the
administrator’s role in providing students with educational opportunity
and the
understanding needed to participate in a democratic society:
Most of all school leaders must let their ethical and moral concerns for students guide their foray into the political arena and strive to use the political process to improve opportunities for students and protect their right to become productive members of our democratic society.
She understands the political nature of public education.
Bolman and Deal (1997) define politics as the battle for scarce resources. According to them, the “political frame” (political aspects of an organization) is about forming coalitions and garnering resources. Organizational members persuade those around them, and join with each other to move the organization forward. They do this by having innovative ideas and by spending resources in new ways. These descriptions fit private enterprise, but not schools.
Because schools are bureaucratic hierarchies, battles over scarce resources take place only between those at the same level -- teacher vs. teacher, principal vs. principal, superintendent vs. superintendent. This is because, according to the rules of bureaucratic hierarchy, when subordinates disagree with superiors about resource allocation, there is no battle – superiors decide. Consequently, teachers’ experiences with school politics are unpleasant battles with peers over the tiniest of resources. Bureaucratic hierarchy governs the “battle for scarce resources” by making school politics about the battle with peers for every little resource.
It is important to distinguish the political nature of educational administration from the mention of politics in the lists of knowledge, skills and dispositions. These lists never suggest that school administrators should challenge the political structure. Instead, they suggest that administrators should become politically effective within the structure. Being politically wise and active is always recommended.
But this is different from the purpose of this letter, which is to describe how the decisions made within bureaucratic hierarchy oppress those at the bottom of the organization, while advantaging those at the top.
The best example of this is the recent insistence on holding teachers accountable for student test scores. As long as this accountability does not include those at the top of the organization -- school board members, legislators, and other policy makers – it is hollow accountability.
Many of you have learned these things, but you do not use this language. Instead, you use the language of the effective schools and effective principals literature as you assume that teachers need to be supervised by administrators. You say things like, “Principals and teachers need to be team players.” “Principals need to be instructional leaders and good managers.” “Principals need to earn the trust and respect of teachers.” These conclusions of the effective principals’ literature fit so well with the assumptions of bureaucratic hierarchy that we ought to question if the data would lead to these conclusions; if bureaucratic hierarchy was not in place to influence the data.
After we ask you to understand the moral and political bases of your field, we ask you to consider alternatives to bureaucratic hierarchy. When you have classes with professors who favor community over bureaucratic hierarchy, you are required to speak the language of leadership, trust, risk taking, vision, and communal relationships. This is our attempt to become relevant, but it makes you uncomfortable.
Professors have jobs that protect their right to speak out, but you lead, trust, take risks, share a vision and build communal relationships at great risk to your career. Therefore, many of you reject our teaching as the idealistic rantings of those who do not understand the real world of school administration.
Your
Career
If these are some of the reasons you experience internal conflict and irrelevance, how can you resolve these without jeopardizing your career? The first step is to recognize the assumptions upon which bureaucratic hierarchy is built, and the effects of these assumptions. The second step is to consider new ways to organize schools.
According to Paulo Freire (1993) educational organizations use a banking model. Teachers make knowledge deposits in students' heads. After enough investments have been acquired, students withdraw and use their knowledge for personal gain. In our system, even adult students return to educational institutions to get "deposits" before they reap promotions, raises, etc.
Freire (1993) contrasts the banking model with a “liberation” model, which coincides with what he considers the true purpose of education. To accomplish liberation, teachers work with students to help them grow. They invest in the student, not in decontextualized knowledge and skills.
Freire (1993) explains that dialogue is the method of the liberation model, and dialogue requires:
an intense
faith in humankind, faith in their power to make and remake,
to create and re-create, faith in their vocation to be more fully human
(which
is not the privilege of an elite, but the birthright of all) . .
.Without this
faith in people, dialogue is a farce which inevitably degenerates into
paternalistic manipulation. (pp. 71-72)
This faith contrasts sharply with the mistrust and oppression that are the pillars of bureaucratic educational institutions. This is important because the model and the method determine what we are able to accomplish -- either deposits of knowledge, or personal growth and liberation. Freire (1997) points out that a banking model does not liberate, and a liberation model does not indoctrinate with either the messages of oppressors or liberators.
The banking model is delivered through bureaucratic hierarchy. As long as we assume that administrators should not trust teachers to do what is best for the school, and teachers should not trust students to do what is best for the classroom, we will not adopt the liberation model because that model requires faith in students and teachers. Nobody has faith in those they do not trust.
So, the choice of model is important. Choosing one model and hoping to achieve what is only possible in the other creates conflict. For example, educators believe schools should be structured as bureaucratic hierarchies, but they also believe they should liberate. Another example might be that you have faith in your students and colleagues, but bureaucratic hierarchy requires you to mistrust. What can you do to resolve these conflicts?
One alternative is to understand that by choosing bureaucratic hierarchy, you are choosing stability, mistrust, and oppression over change and liberation. Once you understand this, things will make more sense in your career. You will not try to change things because you will know that bureaucratic hierarchy is designed for stability, not change. Similarly, you will not try to lead because that would create disequilibrium, in which case you are likely to be expelled from the organization by those who want stability. Instead, if you decide to choose this model, you can preserve it by oppressing those lower in the hierarchy. If it makes you feel better, you can do it with a smile.
The Current Model
Another alternative is to consider a different model, but before you do, you should understand the strengths and benefits of bureaucratic hierarchy. This model serves several useful purposes. Dostoevsky’s (1984) Grand Inquisitor explained one reason we choose an oppressive, mistrusting structure. He convincingly argued that people want to give away their freedom:
In the end they will lay their freedom at our feet, and say to us, “Make us your slaves, but feed us.” They will understand themselves, at last, that freedom and bread enough for all are inconceivable together, for never, never will they be able to share between them! They will be convinced, too, that they can never be free, for they are weak, vicious, worthless and rebellious.
Reading this short work of fiction is a challenge to many of you. It makes you feel uncomfortable because you see the truth of the Grand Inquisitor’s argument, and you are wishing that Jesus would argue against him. But Jesus does not argue. He speaks not a word.
But this is just fiction. We don’t rely on stories to tell us how to organize ourselves. We rely on theories and principles to help us make sense out of our organizational experiences. How do social scientists describe educational administration -- this position of authority you aspire to?
Arguments about the
proper role of
authority are deeply rooted in Western civilization.
According to Russell (1968), the
The reformers of this variety argued about the troubles found in the disorder of the church and that disorder could be cured by means of discipline. This discipline was to be achieved by strengthening the authority of the Church and bolstering the power and efficiency of those in charge of the Christian society . . . The arguments of order dominated political as well as theological theory. One historian of medieval political thought, Walter Ullmann, calls their point of view the “descending theory” of authority: God delegates his authority to an earthly vicar (the emperor or the pope, depending upon one's point of view), who in turn delegates it to his officers, secular authority to temporal lords and spiritual authority to ecclesiastical lords. In order to be in conformity with God’s will, one has only to obey his superiors. If by chance they should err, they bear the responsibility for their error but their inferiors are not to reason why.
The “descending theory” of authority coincides with the mistrusting, oppressive nature of bureaucratic hierarchy. Some might say power elites have built this system as a way to control educated, as well as, uneducated people. But this is not a conspiracy. Educational power elites simply act out of self-interest as they sponsor a bureaucratic hierarchy that oppresses students and teachers. The transaction is completed, without anybody noticing, as administrators, teachers, and students willingly give away their freedom. One of the strengths of bureaucratic hierarchy is that everybody gets what they want -- superiors get control, authority, status, prestige; and subordinates get to shirk freedom and responsibility. When educational institutions are structured as bureaucratic hierarchies, however, the irony is obvious as people give away freedom and responsibility within the institution that is supposed to liberate.
A second strength of bureaucratic hierarchy is that it prevents anarchy. Public schools and classrooms exist at the edge of chaos. Therefore, educators avoid anarchy at all costs, and they willingly become bureaucratic functionaries and well-intentioned oppressors to guard against the slightest hint of anarchy. You need to decide, for yourself, if oppressive schooling is the best approach to avoiding anarchy in schools.
Bureaucratic hierarchy has weaknesses, too. For example, this structure prevents organizational members from addressing unhealthiness within the organization. Bureaucratic hierarchy is designed for stability, not for improvement and organizational health. Its two purposes are to efficiently accomplish goals identified by those at the top, and to preserve itself (Boyd, 1989). By being such a stable organizational structure, bureaucracies effectively suppress challenges to the status quo – legitimate challenges as well as illegitimate ones.
That is why Senge’s (1990) “learning organization” idea was revolutionary. He pointed out that, in order to be a learning (growing, healthy) organization, members had to operate differently from the bureaucratic ways that dominate organizations. Like the “learning organizations” described in The Fifth Discipline, schools considered "good schools" are ones that have pushed the bureaucratic hierarchy into the background and pulled the circle of community forward. The main question you should ask in your graduate program is which part of the organization you will pull forward.
But do not answer that question quickly. Many of you want to preserve bureaucratic hierarchy for two reasons. First, you do not want to see alternatives. A long time ago, as a condition for membership in the organization, you gave away your freedom and responsibility to those above. As a student you gave classroom freedom and responsibility to the teacher. As a teacher, you gave school freedom and responsibility to the principal. And, in your experiences, this worked well. Why should you question it now? You are on the verge of reclaiming some of the freedom and responsibility you gave away as a teacher and student. Its only cost will be the freedom and responsibility of teachers and students, most of whom have already given it away. (You probably do not look at your career aspirations this way, but I assume you are in this program to learn to look at things differently.)
Second, you believe bureaucratic hierarchy is efficient and effective. This belief is so strong that you fail to realize this is true only if the Grand Inquisitor is right – that people want to give away their freedom and responsibility. Students want to give it to teachers; teachers want to give it to administrators; administrators want to give it to school boards; and school boards want to give it to state legislators.
The practice of holding teachers accountable for higher student test scores is a perfect example of how teachers have recently given away their freedom to administrators and legislators. In almost every state and school district where this form of accountability has become part of the educational program, teachers report that they now spend more time teaching to the test. Superiors have defined this goal for teachers, and the result has been a movement toward the shallowest type of accountability imaginable. Teachers now drill students on the curriculum that is going to be tested in the hope that their students will be able to correctly answer a few more multiple choice questions. (The “banking model” is alive and well.)
Such shallow accountability is the only kind possible in bureaucratic hierarchy. When a school’s administrative staff has 20 teachers per administrator, plus the bus drivers, cooks, custodians, specialists, and extra-curricular coaches and advisors, it is impossible for administrators to hold these people accountable in a meaningful way.
If the strength of bureaucratic hierarchy is that it prevents anarchy, and its weakness is that it has no capacity for growth, what are we supposed to teach in a program of educational administration? As mentioned earlier, many people, including students, believe we should teach the knowledge, skills, and dispositions needed to be effective within that structure.
Those of us who reject that idea, do so for two reasons. First, if you did not have good skills and dispositions when you entered the program, you will not learn them by going to class, reading, and doing written reports. Job performance has little to do with such graduate school tasks. You know that, and professors who have been school administrators know that.
Second, focusing on this purpose assumes that principals should become more effective, well-intentioned bureaucratic functionaries. On the contrary, we desperately want to remove the mask of good intentions. Students sometimes admit, "I realize I am an oppressor, and that is what I sometimes need to do. It is no big deal. Sometimes I preserve hierarchy; other times I build community. My intentions are good, so I am serving my school well." We want you to realize that the oppressed do not care about oppressors’ intentions, nor should they.
Emphasizing good intentions is practical to a point. The oppressed may be better off with well-intentioned oppressors than with evil oppressors. But good intentions must not be allowed to mask the moral and political elements of public education. Yes, educators are genuinely well-intentioned, but that does not help those students, parents, and teachers who are disadvantaged by the political status quo, and by bureaucratic hierarchy and the assumptions on which it is built.
Many of you recognize that trust is essential to effective leadership. You have also observed that, even though trust is difficult to build, and it takes a long time to develop, it is easily destroyed. Do you see that you destroy what is essential for community when you preserve hierarchy? Have your experiences and studies taught you that community can only be built by choosing structures that liberate? If not, before you graduate, we want you to consider that, in fundamental ways, building community destroys bureaucratic hierarchy, just as preserving hierarchy destroys community.
That is why it is a big deal when you mistrust and oppress while behaving as bureaucratic functionaries. By their very nature, mistrust and lack of faith -- the pillars on which bureaucracy is built -- sink deep into your relationships. One cannot mistrust another at a surface level. Mistrust goes to the heart of a relationship; so do not be persuaded by those who suggest that you can build trust within bureaucratic hierarchy. You sense the hypocrisy of your superiors, your subordinates will do the same. Only after you realize that the hierarchical structure you take for granted is based on mistrust can you see that deep trust is impossible within that structure. You can choose to mistrust and oppress with a smile, but it will still be experienced as mistrust and oppression.
A communitarian model is an alternative to bureaucratic hierarchy. Many parochial schools choose community instead of bureaucratic hierarchy. In fact, if they are not a community, they have little reason to exist. Public schools can choose community, too. The best ones usually do. The next chapter describes what this look likes. This chapter concludes by explaining that community is actually more efficient and effective than bureaucratic hierarchy, and then explaining what that means for those of us who want to improve both the teaching and the practice of educational administration.
To illustrate that community is more efficient and effective than bureaucratic hierarchy, I offer several examples of how the same action results in significantly different outcomes, depending on whether the action is taken from within a bureaucratic hierarchy or a circle of community. The communitarian outcomes in these examples are so much more desired than the bureaucratic ones that the communitarian approach is clearly more efficient and effective.
The first example is giving praise and rewards. When bestowed from the hierarchy, praise and rewards manipulate. They are given by those in power to encourage desired behavior. Award recipients often say that recognition from colleagues and peers carries more meaning than awards from superiors. The reason is simple -- awards from superiors manipulate subordinates and preserve the hierarchy, so the award carries suspicion, along with recognition.
This is why schools often experience conflict over “Teacher of the Year” awards. As administrators participate in the selection procedure, or as they hold a veto, these awards effectively reinforce the hierarchy in subtle, powerful ways.
On the other hand, praise and rewards freely given and received by all members within the community do not manipulate. They fuel positive, committed, organizational membership because they are shared among trusting, respectful, appreciative organizational members. Communitarian schools recognize excellence by noticing, praising and rewarding all members of the organization as much as possible. In this way the benefits of praise and reward become the basis for building even stronger community.
Bolman and Deal’s (1997) four frames theory also illustrates that the same action can have different results, depending on whether it is taken from within hierarchy or community. When looking at the same situation through the same frame, you will see different things, depending on whether you are in "hierarchy house" or "community house."
Consider an initiative aimed at improving communication with parents and the community. If we are in "hierarchy house," and we look through the human relations frame, we see a public relations effort. If we are in "community house," however, which includes parents and other members of the public, as we look through the human relations frame, we see community engagement and enlargement.
A public relations effort attempts to connect the bureaucracy to the external communities of parents, businesses, grandparents, and alumni. Public schools claim they want to build community, but because they are part of a bureaucratic hierarchy, which is separate from the community, they are forced to do this by engaging in public relations efforts.
In “community house,” though, many groups are part of the organization. As a parent, grandparent, alumnus, or business you feel a part of the organization. Therefore, a public relations effort is not only unnecessary, it would be experienced as an insult.
A third example of an action that has different results, depending on the organizational model, concerns Bolman and Deal’s political frame. When viewed from within community, this frame involves forming coalitions and garnering resources and support for various causes and purposes. When viewed from within hierarchy, however, we see that those at the top of the organization suppress coalitions. They have already won the battle for scarce resources, by virtue of being in a top position in the hierarchy, and they do not want coalitions to challenge their plans for distributing scarce resources.
This is not because those at the top are selfish or conspiratorial. They are well-intentioned people who have been given authority, power, and influence by superiors and subordinates. They believe in the goodness of their intentions, so they believe they are doing what the organization wants as they allocate resources according to their desires. This is so, even when resources are used to preserve the hierarchy at the expense of other organizational purposes. Once you start looking, you will see many instances of where the primary purpose of a resource allocation is to preserve the system. This is because, the higher up in the hierarchy, the more authority one has over resource allocation, and the more one is expected to preserve the hierarchy. One does not rise in the hierarchy without demonstrating a proper devotion to preserving it. It is an elegant, closed system – one that is not designed for its own preservation more than for efficiency and effectiveness.
These are just a few of the ways that community is more efficient and more effective than bureaucratic hierarchy. The principle is simple– all the resources that bureaucratic hierarchy have to devote to mistrusting and oppressing can be put toward liberating and producing in the communitarian model. Many recent studies have found that liberated employees are more productive than oppressed ones, which was the main message of the popular book In Search of Excellence (Peters & Waterman, 1982). Still, bureaucratic hierarchy thrives – a testament to its stability and resistance to change.
Finally, educational leadership students should understand that this conflict between oppression and liberation explains why you experience no relationship between the theory learned in graduate classes and the realities you face in schools. For example, you have heard over and over that “vision” is important, that visionary leadership is needed to point us in new directions to pursue excellence and community, blah, blah, blah.
Many of you experience, however, that “vision” only gets you in trouble. Few things in education are regarded with as much suspicion as creative, new ideas that challenge fundamental ways of operating. That is why you say in class, “We cannot operate that way. We would lose our job. We would lose control. We would lose respect.”
You are right. You would lose your job because the Grand Inquisitor is right -- people give away freedom and responsibility. You are expected to do the same with your superiors and take freedom and responsibility away from your subordinates.
But the point of Dostoyevsy's work is not to excuse those who give away their freedom and responsibility. It is to challenge all of us to take it back. Unless some of our students take back their freedom and responsibility and exercise it in the cause of liberating others, our educational institutions will fail to achieve their liberating purpose. Even more disappointing, though, they will continue to oppress and you will join the ranks of oppressors.
Our job, as professors, is to challenge you to be liberators, instead of well-intentioned oppressors. That is why we promote "vision," "relationships," "trust," "forming teams," "building community," "leadership,” and “the symbolic frame.” We desperately want you to be wise, effective, and true to the liberation purpose of education. This requires creativity and deep thinking. You will not become a liberator by studying textbooks, listening to guest speakers, and doing term papers. You will do it only by experiencing community in your professional life, by turning the hierarchy upside down, by being open to variations on what you once believed, and by discovering new strengths inside you.
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